Superlative Primary Mirrors
The largest optical telescope in the world as of 2009 to use a non-segmented single-mirror as its primary mirror is the 8.2 m (8.7 yards) Subaru telescope of the National Astronomical Observatory of Japan, located in Mauna Kea Observatory on Hawaii since 1997; however, this is not the largest diameter single mirror in a telescope, the U.S./German/Italian Large Binocular Telescope has two 8.4 m (9.2 yards) mirrors (which can be used together for interferometric mode). Both of these are smaller than the 10 m segmented primary mirrors on the two Keck telescope. Radio and submillimeter telescopes use much larger dishes or antennae, which do not have to be made as precisely as the mirrors used in optical telescopes. The Hubble Space Telescope has a 2.4 m (7 ft 10 in) primary mirror.
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Famous quotes containing the words superlative, primary and/or mirrors:
“You say there is no religion now. ‘Tis like saying in rainy weather, there is no sun, when at that moment we are witnessing one of his superlative effects.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)
“If the accumulated wealth of the past generations is thus tainted,—no matter how much of it is offered to us,—we must begin to consider if it were not the nobler part to renounce it, and to put ourselves in primary relations with the soil and nature, and abstaining from whatever is dishonest and unclean, to take each of us bravely his part, with his own hands, in the manual labor of the world.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)
“At bottom, man mirrors himself in things; he considers everything beautiful that reflects his own image: the judgment “beautiful” is the vanity of his species.”
—Friedrich Nietzsche (1844–1900)